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Francis Picabia - L’Oeil [c.1919]


L’Oeil is one of Picabia’s most refined machinist compositions, works made by the artist between 1915 and 1920 that encapsulate the modern machine aesthetic. These pictures rely heavily upon the artist’s use of symbolism to represent human situations, where a machine or machine parts are often appropriated to invoke sexual interaction. “The machine has become more than a mere adjunct of human life,” he proclaimed during the time of his second visit to the United States in 1915. “It is really a part of human life - perhaps the very soul.” He went on to explain exactly how he planned to use the new machinist technology in his work. “In seeking forms through which to interpret ideas or by which to expose human characteristics I have come at length upon the form which appears most brilliantly plastic and fraught with symbolism. I have enlisted the machinery of the modern world, and introduced it into my studio.”

[Sold for $4,309,000 at Sotheby’s Auctions - Oil and gouache on card laid down on board, 68 x 50.7 cm]

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